At the end of September, BSSC’s annual Club Championships provided four nights of fast and furious swimming from over 100 members, recording more than 650 results across 32 events, countless personal bests and many qualification times for the 2020 Hertfordshire County Championships. The girls had many great performances, but the boys were in particularly good record-breaking style, with 10 All Time Club Records sent tumbling over the 4 nights. In the 12/13 Years age group, Mohamed (Sami) Zemzami broke an amazing 7 club records (50/100/200/400m Freestyle, 100/200m Butterfly and the 400m IM) including 2 held by Kieran Huggett since 2008 (200m Fly & 400m IM). In the 14/15 Yrs group Tom Ogden broke his own 100m IM record and Mehdi El Mansar broke his own 400m Free record, whilst in the Open age category Bryn Couser took Tom McKenny’s 1991 100m Breaststroke record.
There were far too many results to mention them all, but the full list of results is posted on our website. The biggest events were the Girls 12/13 Yrs 100m Freestyle with 23 swimmers and the Girls 13 & Under Yrs 200m Freestyle with 31 swimmers, both of which were won by Kaia Phillips. The number of boys in the younger age group showed great promise for the future of the club, with 13 competitors in the 9 & Under 50m Freestyle (won by Samuel Bird) and 14 in the 10/11 Yrs 50m Freestyle (won by Leo Suo-Saunders).
What was lovely to see (and most definitely hear!) was the support given amongst the squads. Friendships were cemented poolside between races, and cheering squads formed to encourage friends to better themselves in the pool. Congratulations to everyone who achieved a goal over the four evenings, be it not being DQ’d in a stroke that previously proved tricky, improving a start or turn, matching or bettering a PB, winning a medal, qualifying for Counties or reaching a Regional time.
Finally, a HUGE thanks to everyone who helped make all four nights a success. We couldn’t run these events without the help of volunteers before, during and after all four nights – from Pam Spratt kicking off all the administration of licences, pool hire etc months before the event; Dominic Mason organising the officials; Nicky Fields sorting the finances and the raffle; Danielle Reilly organising refreshments; Pam & Graham Spratt in the office on the day; all the fabulous Officials helping on the day; and the army of volunteers helping across all four nights. It was particularly good to see some new faces helping out – thank you!
